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Apr 2711:00 AM EDT
-12:00 PM EDT
Prefer video-based learning? The Target Test Prep OnDemand course is a one-of-a-kind video masterclass featuring 400 hours of lecture-style teaching by Scott Woodbury-Stewart, founder of Target Test Prep and one of the most accomplished GMAT instructors
Apr 2808:00 AM PDT
-11:00 AM PDT
Whether you are just beginning your MBA journey or fine-tuning your path to a 700+ score, GMAT Day is designed to give you a competitive edge.
09 Dec 2021, 01:24
Kudos
Bookmarks
It was during my final year at my undergraduate school that I started to think about the next phase in life. On most days, I would spend hours at a time contemplating about appearing for placements at college or applying for higher studies abroad.
Having spend most of my childhood abroad, I eventually realised that I wanted to work and live abroad in the long term. After some discussions with my friends and family, I decided that I will start my professional journey in India before moving abroad. I opted to sit for campus placements and eventually made it to a company in India.
There was a three month gap between my last day at college and my first day at work, hence I decided to prepare for the GMAT during those 3 months.
I opted for GMAT because I wanted to do an MBA abroad; I believe that an MBA will give me the tools to understand business and to delineate the do’s from the don'ts. I was very active in college and enjoyed taking up roles, organising events and interacting with people. I believe that an MBA would give me the confidence to take up such roles in the corporate world. Also my MBA learning would be enriched by my added work experience and hence I would be able to contribute better to my peer group at a B-school.
In 2019 June, I bought myself a copy of OG 2019 and the verbal review, and took the diagnostic test. The results weren’t too shoddy. I was able to score above average in quant section and average in the verbal section. I found geometry, permutation and probability questions particularly troublesome in the quant section, and in the verbal section, critical reasoning (CR) was the question type in which I made the most mistakes.
Motivated by the okay results, I began practicing few verbal and quant questions . I also opted for one of the Inexpensive study programs available online. I never enjoyed the verbal materials of the study program because it did not cover the basics, and the critical reasoning section lacked depth. Nevertheless, I was able to fly through the chapter tests because the course tested the easier concepts. I enjoyed the quant material as it covered certain new ways of solving problems.
After a months preparation, I went ahead and wrote my first GMAT Prep practice test and ended up with a score of 640 (V32 and Q45).
Not too demotivated by the result, I continued studying till the end of July and wrote the second practice exam to score a 640 (V32 and Q45).
It was already August and my company asked me to report to the office by mid August.
I decided to take the real GMAT test in the first week of August assuming that the real GMAT is easier the the practice test. My assumption turned out to be a big disaster and a massive waste of money. I ended up scoring a 600(Q44 V28). I was slightly demotivated. Little did I know that only 30% of the test takes scored a 600 or more. The Quant as well as the verbal sections were way harder than those of the practice tests, and I was quizzed a lot more on the topics that I was never good at. These factors led to my downfall on the test day.
But, to be fair, I did not study for more than 2 hours a day and never bothered spending more time on the topics that I found hard. I was enthusiastically looking forward to my new job and I knew that there are good 2–3 years between then and my MBA admissions. These factors served as an incentive to work slower than usual and take the exam casually the first time. I was not too sad about the results. The 600 made me realise that I needed to do some thorough and structured study before I could achieve my target score.
I did not have any idea on how long I needed to study or when I needed to take the exam again to achieve my target score of 700+. On this leg of confusion, I paused my GMAT preparation.
I reported to my office in Jamshedpur by mid August. Office was fun, meeting new people, learning new skills and leading new teams, but among 9 hours at office, cooking food, washing clothes and a Sunday off, I never found time to chase GMAT.
I spent about 4 months in Jamshedpur, training and learning more about work before being transferred to Bangalore to another business unit. I was looking forward to my transfer because it came with 2 days of weekly off. I assumed that the 2 day off would give me more time to study.
By January, I reported to the Bangalore office. Spent a month acclimating to Bangalore and its vibe.
In February a lot of things happened at once, I decided to give GMAT another go, Covid-19 decided to slowly wear trouser in people’s social life, I found an amazing GMAT tutor who wrote the brilliant book titled “GMAT Sentence Correction Nirvana”, attended few classes, and found an amazing friend with whom I could study GMAT.
Then in March India came to a standstill; Lockdown was imposed, offices turned virtual and GMAT classes were online.
On the upside, I could repurpose the commute time to study time. The online classes were rigours with a lot of post class assignments. With the input from classes and the insights from my friend, I slowly improved my ability to solve sentence correction questions. He also introduced me to GMAT club, which turned out to be one of the most valuable resources in my verbal section preparation for GMAT.
By April, the classes concluded. It was up to my friend and I to continue our learning. Week after week, we learned various concepts in sentence correction and applied it to various questions, gradually attaining the acumen to solve similar questions in the real exam. We spent more time analysing questions and its answers than solving them. This analysis formed an indispensable part of the GMAT Preparation. During this time, I also discovered this amazing book called GMAT Critical Reasoning Bible. This book was an eye opener and it made me rethink my approach to solving the CR questions in the GMAT.
Then a disaster struck. A combination of sedentary lifestyle and burnout due to the newly adopted work from home policy made me sick.
I could hardly sleep well or eat food due to irritable bowel syndrome. This made me too tired, and I could not focus much on studies or at work. I had to force-myself to take time off from work, and eventually I shed quite a lot of my body weight due to this condition. This period pulled me down mentally, but people around me cheered me up and doctors reassured me that I would get better in about 2 months time.
By July, I was back in Kerala. The support of my family gave me ample amount of time that I could spend studying. It was probably my drastic loss of appetite and weight that alarmed my family, I was surrounded with good food, which naturally ameliorated my mood. I also went out walking everyday, trying to average 8 KM a day walking, which eventually improved my appetite and health.
I went back to studying for GMAT and started spending upwards of 4hrs a day studying and solving questions and discussing them with my friend. This combination of hard-work and analysis helped us improve in both Verbal and CR. By December, I had exhausted quite a few the official verbal questions available online and in the GMAT Club.
I also discovered GMATNinja in GMAT Club, who has a couple of videos uploaded in YouTube that covers various verbal topics. His materials, explanations and humility are one of the best things out there that can improve your verbal score.
I thoroughly enjoyed this period of learning because I saw the most improvement during this time, and I was able to solve some of the toughest verbal questions out there.
Having gained some confidence in verbal, I re-attempted practice exams 1 and 2 from GMATPrep; I scored a 710( Q49 V38) and a 710(Q46 V41) in each of the tests. These tests motivated me to study more. Until this point I had never studied quant seriously, so I decided to study a few topics such as inequality, probability, and rates that I found quite hard.
I spent two more months learning quant, and solving more verbal problems. But a greater part of my focus was still on solving verbal questions.
I subscribed to the ExpertsGlobal test series and decided to take one test every week. I was scoring between 700–730 except that one time when I scored a 680. It boosted my confidence, but beyond that these tests did not add any value because the verbal questions lacked the flavour of the actual GMAT and because of the non adaptive nature of the tests. I also decided against writing the remaining GMATPrep practice tests, So that I could use them later in case I needed them again.
I took the official exam online in April. To my dismay, I scored an abysmal 610 ( Q36 and V37). This appalling performance came at the time of a series of setback in various job interviews that I had attended. I was once again down mentally. But with in a week, I was back to my usual-self, thanks to the the conversations I had with the people around me and their support. I also spoke to my friend who had written GMAT then but had to quit the exam mid-way because of a technical error. We both found the quant section daunting and many questions had an unfamiliar pattern. We both came to a conclusion that a lot more effort has to be put into quant to perform better.
Both of us subscribed to one of our best investments for GMAT. The Target Test Prep course. This was a game changer, It had an extensive and exhaustive course structure and tonnes of questions to solve. I spent upwards of 400 Hrs on the course solving various questions, learning new concepts and analysing various errors that I commonly made. This course drastically improved my confidence in Quant. I owe most of what I learned in quant to this course. The verbal lessons are also amazing, but my focus was primarily on quant.
I attempted GMATPrep Test 3 with the renewed confidence in Quant. I scored a Q49 and V40 to score an 720. This score was despite the fact that I found the test 3 much harder than the other tests that I have taken.
Unknowingly, I slacked off in my verbal preparation because of my new found obsession with quant.
In October, I decided to take the official GMAT yet again, at a test centre. The administrators were very kind and made me comfortable at the centre. I started with the quant section and found it to be easier than usual. When I took my first break I was relieved by the fact that the section was easier than I anticipated it to be. I started the verbal section, only to panic in the middle of the exam. I had to spend a lot more time on two of the reading comprehension passages than I usually do. This grave mistake left me with less than adequate time to complete the remaining questions. By the end of the section, I knew that I had messed up the verbal section. I anxiously looked at my results screen and found that I had scored a 660 (Q47 V34) this was the 78th percentile. This was an okay score for me.
I decided to keep the 660 score as it would help me apply to certain B schools and a career advancement program in work place’s parent organisation.
The very next day, I ordered the Enhanced Score Report to further probe into my verbal performance. I found that my performance in the critical reasoning was shallower than usual.
I decided to study Target Test Preps CR modules to refresh the approaches to CR. This effort was fruitful, I did pick up certain details that I had missed earlier.
I studied for 3 weeks, exhausted most of the official question in GMAT club before being burned out. A week before my exam. I decided to stop studying and focus more on the certain question types that I frequently found tricky. I also decided to spend more time with my family than with my books. Also whenever I felt burnt out, I spent time watching tv shows such as Still Game and the IT crowd. I kept myself happy for the remaining length of the week. I ended the day before the exam ,watching a hilarious episode from Still Game.
On November 7th, I went to the now familiar exam centre. The administrator remembered me from my last attempt, offered me coffee and made me comfortable.
I started the exam with the Quant section. I found the first 20 questions easy, but laden with delicious traps but the remaining questions sent some heavy blows to my shiny new armour of preparedness, I had to think on my feet. I was presented with questions that were way harder than I wanted them to be. Nevertheless, I believed in myself and moved on with the section.
In the break, I was certain that Quant section was a disaster, because of my performance in the last 10 questions.
I went back to the exam room with a heavy heart and started the verbal section. A very lengthy passage containing question types not familiar to me flashed on screen, throwing me off for a while. I rushed through the passage and solved the subsequent SC, CR and RC questions. They were hard, but I was able to spend enough time on them and solve them. Once I completed the exam, I anxiously glanced at my screen. I was surprised to see a 710 (Q47 V40). I wiped my eyes at once and looked at the screen once again to make sure that I read it right.
I was humbled by the results and walked out of the examination room with a smiling face, the administrator congratulated and asked me about my plans after offering me a coffee.
I called my family and informed them about the result. They were extremely happy, they immediately asked me what I would do next, as every responsible parent would. I told them that I needed time to make the best judgement on the selection of B-schools and think more about the career advancement options that I have in my organization.
The fruitful preparation journey was one of the most memorable experiences in my life. It was difficult, but nevertheless worthwhile. This period taught me resilience. This experience humbled me and taught me about bouncing back from failures.
If you are planning a retake or want to give GMAT a go. Please feel free to reach out to me. I will be happy to help !
Having spend most of my childhood abroad, I eventually realised that I wanted to work and live abroad in the long term. After some discussions with my friends and family, I decided that I will start my professional journey in India before moving abroad. I opted to sit for campus placements and eventually made it to a company in India.
There was a three month gap between my last day at college and my first day at work, hence I decided to prepare for the GMAT during those 3 months.
I opted for GMAT because I wanted to do an MBA abroad; I believe that an MBA will give me the tools to understand business and to delineate the do’s from the don'ts. I was very active in college and enjoyed taking up roles, organising events and interacting with people. I believe that an MBA would give me the confidence to take up such roles in the corporate world. Also my MBA learning would be enriched by my added work experience and hence I would be able to contribute better to my peer group at a B-school.
In 2019 June, I bought myself a copy of OG 2019 and the verbal review, and took the diagnostic test. The results weren’t too shoddy. I was able to score above average in quant section and average in the verbal section. I found geometry, permutation and probability questions particularly troublesome in the quant section, and in the verbal section, critical reasoning (CR) was the question type in which I made the most mistakes.
Motivated by the okay results, I began practicing few verbal and quant questions . I also opted for one of the Inexpensive study programs available online. I never enjoyed the verbal materials of the study program because it did not cover the basics, and the critical reasoning section lacked depth. Nevertheless, I was able to fly through the chapter tests because the course tested the easier concepts. I enjoyed the quant material as it covered certain new ways of solving problems.
After a months preparation, I went ahead and wrote my first GMAT Prep practice test and ended up with a score of 640 (V32 and Q45).
Not too demotivated by the result, I continued studying till the end of July and wrote the second practice exam to score a 640 (V32 and Q45).
It was already August and my company asked me to report to the office by mid August.
I decided to take the real GMAT test in the first week of August assuming that the real GMAT is easier the the practice test. My assumption turned out to be a big disaster and a massive waste of money. I ended up scoring a 600(Q44 V28). I was slightly demotivated. Little did I know that only 30% of the test takes scored a 600 or more. The Quant as well as the verbal sections were way harder than those of the practice tests, and I was quizzed a lot more on the topics that I was never good at. These factors led to my downfall on the test day.
But, to be fair, I did not study for more than 2 hours a day and never bothered spending more time on the topics that I found hard. I was enthusiastically looking forward to my new job and I knew that there are good 2–3 years between then and my MBA admissions. These factors served as an incentive to work slower than usual and take the exam casually the first time. I was not too sad about the results. The 600 made me realise that I needed to do some thorough and structured study before I could achieve my target score.
I did not have any idea on how long I needed to study or when I needed to take the exam again to achieve my target score of 700+. On this leg of confusion, I paused my GMAT preparation.
I reported to my office in Jamshedpur by mid August. Office was fun, meeting new people, learning new skills and leading new teams, but among 9 hours at office, cooking food, washing clothes and a Sunday off, I never found time to chase GMAT.
I spent about 4 months in Jamshedpur, training and learning more about work before being transferred to Bangalore to another business unit. I was looking forward to my transfer because it came with 2 days of weekly off. I assumed that the 2 day off would give me more time to study.
By January, I reported to the Bangalore office. Spent a month acclimating to Bangalore and its vibe.
In February a lot of things happened at once, I decided to give GMAT another go, Covid-19 decided to slowly wear trouser in people’s social life, I found an amazing GMAT tutor who wrote the brilliant book titled “GMAT Sentence Correction Nirvana”, attended few classes, and found an amazing friend with whom I could study GMAT.
Then in March India came to a standstill; Lockdown was imposed, offices turned virtual and GMAT classes were online.
On the upside, I could repurpose the commute time to study time. The online classes were rigours with a lot of post class assignments. With the input from classes and the insights from my friend, I slowly improved my ability to solve sentence correction questions. He also introduced me to GMAT club, which turned out to be one of the most valuable resources in my verbal section preparation for GMAT.
By April, the classes concluded. It was up to my friend and I to continue our learning. Week after week, we learned various concepts in sentence correction and applied it to various questions, gradually attaining the acumen to solve similar questions in the real exam. We spent more time analysing questions and its answers than solving them. This analysis formed an indispensable part of the GMAT Preparation. During this time, I also discovered this amazing book called GMAT Critical Reasoning Bible. This book was an eye opener and it made me rethink my approach to solving the CR questions in the GMAT.
Then a disaster struck. A combination of sedentary lifestyle and burnout due to the newly adopted work from home policy made me sick.
I could hardly sleep well or eat food due to irritable bowel syndrome. This made me too tired, and I could not focus much on studies or at work. I had to force-myself to take time off from work, and eventually I shed quite a lot of my body weight due to this condition. This period pulled me down mentally, but people around me cheered me up and doctors reassured me that I would get better in about 2 months time.
By July, I was back in Kerala. The support of my family gave me ample amount of time that I could spend studying. It was probably my drastic loss of appetite and weight that alarmed my family, I was surrounded with good food, which naturally ameliorated my mood. I also went out walking everyday, trying to average 8 KM a day walking, which eventually improved my appetite and health.
I went back to studying for GMAT and started spending upwards of 4hrs a day studying and solving questions and discussing them with my friend. This combination of hard-work and analysis helped us improve in both Verbal and CR. By December, I had exhausted quite a few the official verbal questions available online and in the GMAT Club.
I also discovered GMATNinja in GMAT Club, who has a couple of videos uploaded in YouTube that covers various verbal topics. His materials, explanations and humility are one of the best things out there that can improve your verbal score.
I thoroughly enjoyed this period of learning because I saw the most improvement during this time, and I was able to solve some of the toughest verbal questions out there.
Having gained some confidence in verbal, I re-attempted practice exams 1 and 2 from GMATPrep; I scored a 710( Q49 V38) and a 710(Q46 V41) in each of the tests. These tests motivated me to study more. Until this point I had never studied quant seriously, so I decided to study a few topics such as inequality, probability, and rates that I found quite hard.
I spent two more months learning quant, and solving more verbal problems. But a greater part of my focus was still on solving verbal questions.
I subscribed to the ExpertsGlobal test series and decided to take one test every week. I was scoring between 700–730 except that one time when I scored a 680. It boosted my confidence, but beyond that these tests did not add any value because the verbal questions lacked the flavour of the actual GMAT and because of the non adaptive nature of the tests. I also decided against writing the remaining GMATPrep practice tests, So that I could use them later in case I needed them again.
I took the official exam online in April. To my dismay, I scored an abysmal 610 ( Q36 and V37). This appalling performance came at the time of a series of setback in various job interviews that I had attended. I was once again down mentally. But with in a week, I was back to my usual-self, thanks to the the conversations I had with the people around me and their support. I also spoke to my friend who had written GMAT then but had to quit the exam mid-way because of a technical error. We both found the quant section daunting and many questions had an unfamiliar pattern. We both came to a conclusion that a lot more effort has to be put into quant to perform better.
Both of us subscribed to one of our best investments for GMAT. The Target Test Prep course. This was a game changer, It had an extensive and exhaustive course structure and tonnes of questions to solve. I spent upwards of 400 Hrs on the course solving various questions, learning new concepts and analysing various errors that I commonly made. This course drastically improved my confidence in Quant. I owe most of what I learned in quant to this course. The verbal lessons are also amazing, but my focus was primarily on quant.
I attempted GMATPrep Test 3 with the renewed confidence in Quant. I scored a Q49 and V40 to score an 720. This score was despite the fact that I found the test 3 much harder than the other tests that I have taken.
Unknowingly, I slacked off in my verbal preparation because of my new found obsession with quant.
In October, I decided to take the official GMAT yet again, at a test centre. The administrators were very kind and made me comfortable at the centre. I started with the quant section and found it to be easier than usual. When I took my first break I was relieved by the fact that the section was easier than I anticipated it to be. I started the verbal section, only to panic in the middle of the exam. I had to spend a lot more time on two of the reading comprehension passages than I usually do. This grave mistake left me with less than adequate time to complete the remaining questions. By the end of the section, I knew that I had messed up the verbal section. I anxiously looked at my results screen and found that I had scored a 660 (Q47 V34) this was the 78th percentile. This was an okay score for me.
I decided to keep the 660 score as it would help me apply to certain B schools and a career advancement program in work place’s parent organisation.
The very next day, I ordered the Enhanced Score Report to further probe into my verbal performance. I found that my performance in the critical reasoning was shallower than usual.
I decided to study Target Test Preps CR modules to refresh the approaches to CR. This effort was fruitful, I did pick up certain details that I had missed earlier.
I studied for 3 weeks, exhausted most of the official question in GMAT club before being burned out. A week before my exam. I decided to stop studying and focus more on the certain question types that I frequently found tricky. I also decided to spend more time with my family than with my books. Also whenever I felt burnt out, I spent time watching tv shows such as Still Game and the IT crowd. I kept myself happy for the remaining length of the week. I ended the day before the exam ,watching a hilarious episode from Still Game.
On November 7th, I went to the now familiar exam centre. The administrator remembered me from my last attempt, offered me coffee and made me comfortable.
I started the exam with the Quant section. I found the first 20 questions easy, but laden with delicious traps but the remaining questions sent some heavy blows to my shiny new armour of preparedness, I had to think on my feet. I was presented with questions that were way harder than I wanted them to be. Nevertheless, I believed in myself and moved on with the section.
In the break, I was certain that Quant section was a disaster, because of my performance in the last 10 questions.
I went back to the exam room with a heavy heart and started the verbal section. A very lengthy passage containing question types not familiar to me flashed on screen, throwing me off for a while. I rushed through the passage and solved the subsequent SC, CR and RC questions. They were hard, but I was able to spend enough time on them and solve them. Once I completed the exam, I anxiously glanced at my screen. I was surprised to see a 710 (Q47 V40). I wiped my eyes at once and looked at the screen once again to make sure that I read it right.
I was humbled by the results and walked out of the examination room with a smiling face, the administrator congratulated and asked me about my plans after offering me a coffee.
I called my family and informed them about the result. They were extremely happy, they immediately asked me what I would do next, as every responsible parent would. I told them that I needed time to make the best judgement on the selection of B-schools and think more about the career advancement options that I have in my organization.
The fruitful preparation journey was one of the most memorable experiences in my life. It was difficult, but nevertheless worthwhile. This period taught me resilience. This experience humbled me and taught me about bouncing back from failures.
If you are planning a retake or want to give GMAT a go. Please feel free to reach out to me. I will be happy to help !
09 Dec 2021, 19:40
Kudos
Bookmarks
Hi allanjoseph97,
What an inspirational story! I'm thrilled to hear that you did not give up on your GMAT goals and also that TTP played such a large role in your GMAT success. Good luck with things moving forward.
What an inspirational story! I'm thrilled to hear that you did not give up on your GMAT goals and also that TTP played such a large role in your GMAT success. Good luck with things moving forward.
09 Dec 2021, 23:08
Kudos
Bookmarks
Your Verbal score is exceptional with V40. Can you let me know what resources you used for Verbal preparation and your learning/experiences that you could share?
